98 + 12 ad pp. dated 1898. 6½x5, original blue cloth binding, with striking front cover illustration in the Belle Epoque style, in red, green and white. First Edition.

The British novelist's first non-fiction work - advices for women journalists. Written ten years after “Nellie Bly” paved the way for American women journalists by breaking the fictional record of Jules Verne’s Phileas Fogg with a trip around the world in 72 days, and faking insanity to write an “insider’s” expose of life in a New York Lunatic Asylum, this book offered little encouragement to young ladies aspiring to similar success - perhaps because it was written by an English man, albeit one who was about to find literary fame of his own. Identified on the title-page only as editor of a women’s magazine, this was the first book of non-fiction by Arnold Bennett, future author of “Old Wives’ Tale”, whose first novel had appeared only a week or two before.